Chairman of the forum of parliamentarians on intellectual property, Murli Manohar Joshi, has questioned limited terms of reference of the recently constituted expert group on intellectual property rights (IPRs).
In a letter to Prime Minister I.K. Gujral, the BJP leader said that It will not be possible to achieve a national consensus on major issues relating to the World Trade Organisation (WTO), with such limited terms of reference. Last month, the Prime Minister had met the forum of parliamentarians on IPRs, which represents a cross-section of political opinion from the Left parties, Janata Dal and Samata Party, to evolve a consensus on issues relating to patents and the WTO.
It was then decided to set up a special group to evolve a national consensus on the appropriate intellectual property rights regime, wherein compliance requirement of the Trips (trade-related intellectual property rights) agreement was only one of the factors to be considered, Joshi said.
In contrast to this decision, the focus of the terms of reference of the expert group is specifically and almost entirely the requirement of articles 70.8 and 70.9 of the Trip agreement, Joshi told the Prime Minister.
The forum of parliamentarians has also taken note of the non-inclusion of the views of the state governments in finalising the composition and terms of reference of the expert group.
The parliamentarians feel that the group, as constituted, will not be in a position to evolve a national consensus on the broad issues affecting national interest and Indias agenda for the WTO.
The letter to the Prime Minister also has the signatures of George Fernandes, president of the Samta Party, Prithviraj D.Chavan of the Congress and Ashok Mitra of the CPI(M).
Last week, the governemnt had announced the constitution of an expert group on IPRs headed by C.N. Rao, chairman, scientific advisory committee in the Cabinet.
The other members include former foreign secreatry Muchkund Dubey, former commerce secretary A.V. Ganesan, chairman of the disinvestment commission G.V. Ramakrishna, member, planning commission, S.P. Shukla, M.G.K. Menon, director general, National Council of Applied Economic Research (NCAER), P.G. Mankad, secreatry, department of industrial development and Parvinder Singh of Ranbaxy.
